Onceagain, our country is facing terror attacks in Mumbai. And once again, I’m afraid we will fail to do anything. Once again, we will talk of the Spirit of Mumbai, shrug off, sleep, get up and go back to work. Once again, politicians will condemn the attacks, there will an enquiry, a committee, a review, a panel, a report – all to be lost in a filing cabinet in South Block. Once again, the world will cry afoul, issue travel advisories, cancel air tickets and hotel bookings, and then visit next year and get high on dope in Varanasi. Once again, the army will be called into action, after the intelligence system has failed, rescue people, save lives, and go back to training camps. Once again, we will fear the economy, FIIs drawing back money, FDI drying up, and everybody will forget in sometime. Once again, a tour will be called off, security concerns will arise, but they will come back in no time salivating for the money. Once again, lives will be lost, relatives will cry, friends will mourn, death certificates made, a compensation announced, and will be forgotten in history. Once again, the injured will pick up the pieces, perhaps with no leg, perhaps with no eyes, and live a life of despicable cruelty ever after. Once again, …

But for how long? For how long will this sceptre repeat, right in front of our eyes and we will fail to take any action. Hasn’t this list of events become an all too common phenomenon? Hasn’t it become so blaise that many times we hardly even notice — ignore the page 1 and turn straight to page 3? What have we done to improve the situation? Where is the Corrective and Preventive Action? Have we even prepared a document, let alone implement it? Where are the criminals of the past crimes? Have we punished enough? Has our political establishment the balls to hang the perpetrators of terror? Punish them such that nobody will try to repeat this mockery of India?

We can all keep talking. Will we ever do anything? Will we stand up for India?

I just wonder.

I hope we are a part of the solution – so just putting down some thoughts. Start a dialog. Let’s see if we can come up with a solution.

Vote – The biggest responsibility for Indians is to vote. That’s the way we can bring about a change in our country. That’s the way to show your country you actually care what the situation is. JaagoRe is a great effort – kudos to them – and let’s support them. And next time, let’s vote in a single party, whoever it be, so that we are not crippled by our slow democratic process. If we end up with a hung assembly again, in the cacophony of the Parliament, the terrorists will get away again.

Respect – I believe that we don’t respect the people who save us enough. Everytime, after the war situation, there is a flurry of patriotic films, saluting the soldiers, the commandos, but films are not enough. We need to give them more respect in real life. Perhaps a regular feature across TV channels on war heroes and those who laid down their lives for the country. Increase their salaries. For God’s sake – many of us work for foreigners, write code, analyze, sell, buy for MNCs – but these guys lay their lives for unknown men and women of India, who perhaps don’t even give back enough in return. They deserve to be paid more than most others. Give them more repect in social circles. Treat them as heroes. Only then will we want to join the Army, rather than using it as the last resort and career option.

Love – We can’t cure this ill with hate. If we started a revenge propaganda, things will never improve. We can only heal if we treat both Hindu and Muslims with love, and not get swayed by brainwashing. We need to be careful about identifying the perpetrators, and punish them with determination, but treat the others with love. If the retaliation is arbitrary and unreasonable, things will only get worse.

Spend – Let’s spend more money on intelligence. Let’s beef it up. The only way to fight these attacks is by fusing them early, since once a man who cares not for his own death has a gun in a room full of people there is very little anybody can do. We need to find the clues early, nab them and nip them in the bud. Repeating the earlier point, how many people do we hear of who are working in intelligence? For a nation of a billion people, a trillion whispers, a gazelleon hiding spaces, there is hardly enough intelligence personnel.

Revisit – Let’s revisit the past crimes, and keep track of whether we actually punished the guilty. Our media stumbles from story to story, and in 3-4 days we will forget everything that’s happened today. Let’s keep track of these, keep checking what’s being done, and make sure the guilty are given exemplary punishment, and the good given reward.

Reward – Let’s reward the brave. Citizens who have saved the lives of others. Both monetarily and socially. Let people feel that our society actually rewards those who serve others.

Educate – Let’s spend more on education. Typically, the people most succeptible to brainwashing are those who are not so educated – and unable to think and understand themselves.

I think I’m coming to the end of my ideas. Will look forward to receiving more in the comments section.

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A fusion of the avant-garde with the traditional, that was the Rhythm Divine. A collaboration borne out of Astad Deboo’s almost 11 year romance with Manipur where he came across Guru Seityabanji and his troupe of Pung Cholom drummers of Shri Shri Govindji Nat Sankirtan. The traditional Pung Cholom drumming metamorphosed with the body vocabulary (as he calls it) of Astad Deboo. A treat to the eyes!

The performance began painfully slow –an almost chrysalis like depiction, extremely slow, with classical background music. In fact, in the first 15 mins I was almost bored! And then the dancers picked up the tempo — with perfect synchronization once they had the beats of drums or of their palms on their thighs (which is how they practice apparently). What followed was visual poetry — the oriental music and dance of the drummers and Astad Deboo who complemented them with emoting fingers, emoting eye-brows and an emoting body.

When the drummers were finally given the drums in the last act (what they are most comfortable with), the music and the dance built up into a crescendo — a fitting end. In the discussion that followed, Deboo described how he’d worked with Manipuri martial artists in the past and then he’d put up a performance with the drummers at the Frankfurt Book fair when India was the guest of honour(2006), and it seems he has made it into a regular feature now.

It was nearing the evening, almost dusk, when I found Chirag and Parag, first standard kids in my neighbourhood, fighting it out in the streets. Muddy shirt and all, it reminded me of the kid in Taare Zameen Par. Of course, it seemed odd to find such good friends fighting it out as it was Maratha Warriors versus Bangalore Hi-fliers (too much of TV I know!). On enquiring, I was told the reason was Chirag called Parag a Monkey. A violent protest followed.

Had that been the story, it would have been natural and logical. However, it wasn’t the case. It was a burly 32 year old (with a pipin’ hot chick) fighting almost over a lolly-pop. I would have empathized had monkey-kind complained on being equated with a monkey with 2 extra lives, but then that’s not how the world works, doesn’t it? The killer of the day, of course, occurred during the post-match ceremony, when my maid came in. She stared at us, stared at the TV, found Symonds talking into the microphone and shouted MONKEY. We kept laughing our guts out for the next 15 minutes.

Of course, in another part of the story, the umpires decided to show who was the boss. I think Steve Bucknor had by this time decided that he’d watched too many men wearing colours winning, making money, singing with Asha, and applying hair gels while sitting out. Until he could make out between morning and evening, who needs a camera? Who needs technology? All ye engineers, sitting in Bangalore, and monkey-tapping (yes!) on your keyboards, take a leave, go visit the pubs, since we need no stump-cameras, we don’t need no snick-o-meter, it’s just another brick taken from the wall, as the rest of the world watches comfortably dumb.

And then, the Aussie umpire (whose name I didn’t bother checking) Benson decided to take help from the fifth umpire (the fourth empire, oops estate, being counted out) Ricky Ponting. Aussies have such a good reputation after all, right? They walk out as soon as realize that they are rightfully out, they never appeal for false catches, and they of course, never use words as kind as Monkey. When Ponting signalled with his one finger, what I couldn’t make out was if he was saying OUT or that one more packet would get deposited in the umpire’s account just like for all the others? We will never find out.

The course of the day could hardly have been altered if these 5 decisions had been justfully given. India is partly to blame for not taking the game to the Aussie camp, not going in for the Aussie ki Taisi, as the fourth empire’s been so wanting to, but giving into the Kangaroos in a game they play only too well. While all the decisions were going their way, they resorted to monkey-tactics to take the attention away. You’d expect the Indians to be seething in anger, resenting the misfortune that came their way even after the gritty knock by Kumble but he has to report to the match-referee because a Kangaroo was called a Monkey, and took offence.

These stories don’t make any difference — the game has been decided, Ricky Ponting’s team has won 16 in a trot (will they complain on being called a horse?), and all of us will soon forget all this, switch our channels, watch some vote-and-make-your-team-win contest and give a damn about talent, grit and determination. In the end, it doesn’t even matter.

Evam is coming back to town with The Odd Couple. The play promises to be another gut-buster with Karthik Kumar and Sunil Vishnu (who also played in ART, see my earlier post). The story is about two divorced men sharing an apartment in NY:

Felix and Oscar are an extremely odd couple: Felix is neurotic, precise, and fastidiously clean. Oscar, on the other hand, is the exact opposite: sloppy and casual. What happens when the two friends are forced to share an apartment, and their differing lifestyles inevitably lead to conflicts- a full laugh riot for the audiences. Add to that their Saturday night poker gang friends: Vinnie- the dutiful husband, Murray- the cop, Roy-Oscar’s accountant and the sarcastic Speed, and the possibility of a date with the “Cuckoo” Pigeon sisters who live in the same apartment- you’ve got a chaotic entertainer for sure!

This Neil Simon situational comedy on one hand is about two opposite people (out of their marriages) deciding to stay together and the chaos and humour which is generated as a result, while on the other hand the story is about friendship, and loneliness — it gives us a glimpse into what makes us cling on to our friends even when they are so opposite to us and can drive us over the wall with their antics — the uncanny bond, which makes friendship such an odd-even relationship! Somewhere it also touches about how easy it is to lose people and how difficult to stay on and make things work — and sometimes you don’t get a choice at all!

The play is being performed with good intent — it is in support of Dare2Dream (find some information in this Hindu article), an NGO working for education in Bangalore. Another reason you should go. The event details are:

In other news, I had a tough time yesterday due to Google maps. We had wanted to go to FUGA for a party and FUGA is on Wood Street. Maps gave the correct address for FUGA as Wood Steet but a completely wrong location (See screenshot below — the location of FUGA that GMaps suggested is marked in “A” inside a red circle, while the actual location is somewhere near the big black dot on the map). Biggest trouble is that Gen Thimmaiah Rd (or Richmond Road as it was earlier known) is one way in the opposite direction (central Bangalore is one (way) big mess) and we had a rather tough time navigating back. There is more irony involved — the event itself was related to Google!

Needless to say, GMaps is an amazingly useful service. However, this means that address and landmark searches are still not 100% and you should take care before blindly trusting them (esp. if you are traveling to a place with lots of one ways).

For those, who want some more entertainment, listen to this Mallu Proposal Letter that I recorded (of course, it was a forward .. I did’nt write it myself, just recorded it!):

Madam:
I am an olden young uncle living only with myself in Thiruvananthapuram. Having seen your advertisement for marriage purposes, I decided to press myself on you and hope you will take me nicely.
I am a soiled son from inside Kerala. I am nice and big, six foot tall and six inches long. My body is filled with hardness, as because I am working hardly. I am playing hardly also. Especially I like cricket and I am a good batter and I am fast baller. Whenever I come running in for balling, other batters start running. Everybody is scared of my rapid balls that bounce a lot.
I am very nice man. I am always laughing loudly at everyone. I am a jolly gay . Especially ladies, they are saying I am nice and soft. I am always giving respect to the ladies. I am always allowing ladies to get on top.That is how nice I am.
I am not having any bad habits. I am not drinking and I am not sucking tobacco or anything else. Every morning I am going to the gym and I am pumping like anything. Daily I am pumping and pumping. If you want you can come and see how much I am pumping the dumb belles in the gym.
I am having a lot of money in my pants and my pants is always open for you. I am such a nice man, but still I am living with myself only. What to do? So I am taking things into my own hands everyday. That is why I am pressing myself on you, so that you will come in my house and take my things into your hand. If you are marrying me madam, I am telling you, I will be loving you very hard every day. In fact, I will stop pumping dumb belles in the gym.
If you are not marrying me madam and not coming to me, I will press you and press you until you come. So I am placing my head between your nicely smelling feet and looking up with lots of hope. I am waiting very badly for your reply and I am stiff with anticipation.
Expecting soon,
Yours and only yours Kutty

There is a disclaimer to go with this. Please don’t consider this either as racist or in bad taste. This is all in good humour. I have some very good Mallu friends — really talented and brilliant — and all they did was laugh :-)

There is also an update on my technical blog about Fran Allen’s talk. Check here.

I went to see ART by Evam yesterday, again a part of Bengalooru Habba. The play originally written by Yasmina Reza, a French actress and playwright. The play is about three friends, who have moved a little apart with time, but the death nail comes when one of them, Sarge, buys a painting. And before you think it’s a serious play, the painting consisted of white diagonal lines on a white background, and Sarge paid a whopping two hundred thousand Francs for it (yes, that is 200,000!).

The play was hilarious. Marc, who was completely against Sarge, and thought he had lost his mind, and was acting pompous, was extremely sarcastic, and Yvan, the bummer who was getting married in a week’s time, gave such amazing expressions that the audience couldn’t help laughing. There was this whole story about contentions between his biological mother, his step mother, and his fiance’s step mother about their names appearing on the wedding card. Marc’s sarcasm and Yvan’s innocent expressions made the day!

The play depicted the relationship becoming sour — Marc’s superiority complex, Sarge’s antagonistic attitude end up almost leading to the breakup of the friendship. The play ends in a sort-of a happy ending, but did leave a few strands for the reader to figure out.

The acting was superb — Evam has been doing this production for the last three years and it showed. The actors were very natural, and Karthik Kumar as Marc and Sunil Vishnu as Yvan were brilliant. The subtle querulous sarcasm, and Yvan’s dumb yet innocent antics lit up the stage. The set itself was pretty elaborate, using more than 30 carton boxes as I had said earlier, to distinguish between the houses of the three friends. The lights worked very well in sync (with only one slip) and it spoke volumes about their practice. I myself was in splits, falling off my seats ever so often. A must watch, if it ever comes around.

I got to talk to Sunil after the play — we had talked when they were here last time with Five Point Someone, and then they came again with And Now For Something Completely Different (but unfortunately, I was away at the time). They are coming back to Bangalore on 25th Dec with another play, and I hope to see them again!

Some more reviews of ART: The HinduDinesh (He has a picture of the set also)

Aside: If the text was too much for you, and you share my interest in Web 2.0 and the rest of the random things on the internet, you might like this video:

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Went to see Mahadevbhai, performed by Working Title productions Mumbai at Chowdiah today as a part of Bengalooru Habba. Mahadevbhai is the story of the freedom struggle told through the eyes of Gandhi’s aide Mahadevbhai Desai. A solo performance by Jaimini Pathak (who had directed a play I saw sometime back “Thukra’s Dream”) who is shown as a budding actor, with a link to Mahadevbhai through his granduncle, and who discovers him and Gandhi through conversations with his grandfather.

The play was quite educative since it refreshed quite a few history lessons I had forgotten — the Champaran and Bardoli satyagraha, the Dandi march and the agitation against the Rowlatt Act (on the same lines as MISA and POTA). However, more than the history lesson, it was the human character it gave to the leaders of our freedom struggle is what I liked. Gandhi is not a chapter in History, but a living person delivering speeches, writing letters and fasting unto death for Hindu Muslim unity. Similarly for Mahadevbhai, a scholar in his own right, who is dedicated to Gandhiji as Hanuman was to Ram, his personal aide and secretary, who maintained one of the most detailed accounts of the freedom struggle in his 27-volume personal diary (I would like to read that sometime!).

It also brings to light what Gandhiji stood for — equality for everybody including one self (being able to stand up against the British and not write in servile language), his Dandi March which was not just an agitation against the government, but the act of the march gave it a life of its own, his fast unto death against untouchability which is perhaps the reason why the curse has reduced so much in our society. It also brings out subtle sarcasm in Godhra being the venue where Gandhi and Jinnah jointly addressed Hindus and Muslims together for the first time, and the attitude of the M.B.A. (Mujhe Bahut Aata hai) elder brother, and the British-obsessed history teacher Ms. Priscilla.

Jaimini Pathak carried off the performance really well. Keeping the audience engaged for 2 hours alone is no mean feat, and Jaimini Pathak and director Ramu Ramanathan are very well deserving of all the praise (it was the 111th performance!). By interspersing Mahadevbhai’s life story with his own, and the conversations with his grandfather and his history teacher ensure that the play gets a graph, and the audience some entertainment. A very good performance, which you must visit if the play comes to your city.

Tomorrow is Art by Evam Productions from Chennai, and I was chatting with Sunil, one of the actors and co-founder of Evam, and he mentioned that they are going to use 30 carton boxes as props. Hmmmm, I need to check that out!

Films featured high on my Sunday yesterday. I attended the Filmcamp‘s workshop on ScriptWriting in the morning at BrewHaHa. Sanjay Nambiar (hopefully I put in the right link here) walked us through the script for The Shawshank Redemption. I don’t think I can start capturing all the details here — but for me the biggest take-away was that you need to be quite detail oriented and be succinct at the same time while writing a script, because the rest of the cast and crew is going to rely on you to give them an idea about what they need to do. It should capture details about location, props, even lighting sometimes. However, it should not be too instructive lest it might limit the creativity of the rest of the rest of the team. The right balance between detail and leaving things open is something one can only get if one has participated in a full project perhaps. I have seen scripts of plays, and they are usually quite similar. For instance, along with all the dialogs that have to be prepared upfront (before you even sign the actors at least in the West!), you might also describe camera angles, voice-overs and so on. Unless you do that, you would not be very kind to producers :-)

What I was left wondering is that if the film is an adaptation of a book, how much changes, what they keep and what they leave out. It was a far more technical discussion than I had expected — and as such they didn’t discuss what differentiates good scripts from bad in terms of content and storyline.

Then, in the evening, I went and watched Om Shanti Om, and unlearned everything. Kudos to SRK and Farah’s guts actually, since they admit all over the movie that the storyline doesn’t make sense. And SRK’s usual overacting (even Kirron Kher — what happened to her?) and Deepika Padukone’s almost non-existent role (they could just have used a portrait! She was so over-hyped; she didn’t even have a role!!) didn’t help things either. The one single joke that I liked best was Soorat Barjatya noting down the ‘No Sorry. No Thank You.’ dialog he later went on to use in Maine Pyaar Kiya. The whole movie felt more like a show-off exercise by King Kong Khan (not to be confused with the other KKK). In fact, SRK has himself admitted this in the past, and I am at my wit’s end trying to understand what women find attractive about monkeys:

Shah Rukh Khan recently quipped that he felt ‘like a monkey’ out to entertain movie buffs!

“I am like a monkey who dances to the tunes of the director, producer and script writer, to entertain cinegoers,” Khan says.

…

“I even dance in my bathroom in front of the mirror!” Khan exclaims.

In other news, Bangalore is abuzz with Bengalooru Habba and there are some great performances. I am especially excited about the English Theater being held at Chowdiah, right beside my home. If you haven’t seen Kanyadaan yet, then you must most definitely go (see the earlier review I had written of the play). The best part about the Habba is that the passes are free and available at Cafe Coffee Day outlets around Bangalore. Don’t miss this!